Language Scwnces. Vol. 18, Nos 1-2, pp.

19-35, 1996
Pergamon Copyright ~ 1996 Published by Elsevier Science Lid
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S0388-0001(96)00005-8

THE PREPOSITIONAL INVENTORY OF LANGUAGES: A FACTOR THAT AFFECTS

COMPREHENSION OF SPATIAL PREPOSITIONS

J. GRABOWSKI and P. WEISS

Chair for Psychology III, University of Mannheim, Schloss EO,

D-68131 Mannheim, Germany

ABSTRACT
Miller and Johnson-Laird's Language and Perception (1976) can be considered a starting point
of the psychological and linguistic investigation into deictic and intrinsic spatial reference, i.e.
into the use and the comprehension of spatial prepositions and their corresponding spatial
concepts. Important factors that affect the choice of either the deictic or the intrinsic frame of
reference have been suggested to be the discourse context, the static vs, dynamic
characteristics of the described situation, the individual cognitive style, and the intrinsic
orientation of the reference object, However, the explanatory determination of people's actual
use of spatial expressions is far from being satisfactory.
We conducted a series of experiments in German, Dutch, French, Italian and English in order
to show that four factors systematically interact when people interpret spatial expressions: (1)
the reference object being intrinsically oriented or not; (2) the preposition that is used; (3) the
social characteristics of the discourse situation; (4) the prepositional inventory of the language
at issue, as regards its spatial and temporal prepositions. Particularly, factors (3) and (4) allow
for a more comprehensive explanation of the empirical results, compared to the hitherto
proposed approaches. In all five languages, some communicative fuzziness, or ambiguity,
remains; however, it occurs in different cases, depending on the prepositional inventories of the
respective languages.

KEYWORDS
Spatial reference; spatial communication; prepositions; deixis; psycholinguistics.

INTRODUCTION
Space is a basic human experience (Gosztonyi, 1976). Therefore, people often communicate,
among other things, about their spatial environment (see Vater, 1991, for a general survey). In
our paper, communication about a quite simple case of spatial facts is dealt with: An object is
in a certain place, or it should be in a certain place. Objects, in a broad range of senses, include
all material things in the world, i.e. organisms as well as physical things. We restrict ourselves

19
20 .1. GRABOWSKI and P. WEISS

to material objects only for simplification; as Jackendoff (1983) points out, states and events
might also be assigned to places.
Basically, there are two reasons why the place of an object is referred to in communication
(Hemnann and Grabowski, 1994): (1) The speaker intends to emphasize an object in order to
direct the hearer's attention to it. This objective can be accomplished by different means: The
speaker can simply name the object (or the category of objects it belongs to) ("the ball"); he or
she can--in a more or less specified way--describe some of the attributes of an object ("the
red, round thing"); or the speaker refers to the place where the intended object is ("the ball on
the carpet"). Thus, if the speaker's goal is to focus on an object, the name of the object, its
description and its localization serve the same function. (2) The speaker intends to emphasize a
place where the object in question is presently located; or where it should be; or where it had
previously been; or where it had never been before; or where it will be in future; or where it
never should be; etc.
Regardless of the communicative purpose that is intended through the specification of the
place of an object: The common characteristic of localizing utterances is a spatial relation being
established between an intended object and a reference object, or between the place of an
intended object and the place occupied by a reference object. (It is an open question whether
objects or places take the arguments of spatial relations; cf. Habel, 1989.)
An appropriate means in order to specify spatial relations between objects is the use of
prepositions. Spatial prepositions can be subdivided according to the type of relation they
express. Prepositions like /n or near refer to the topological structure of space (inclusion,
contact, and proximity); beside, behind, above, and many other prepositions refer to the
dimensional structure of space (cf. Jackendoff and Landau, 1991; Klein, 1994; Landau and
Jackendoff, 1993; Retz-Schmidt, 1988). There are also prepositions that combine topological
and dimensional features, like on which is semantically defined by the conjunction of contact
(topological) and above (dimensional). In the following, we restrict ourselves to dimensional
prepositions (or projective prepositions, as called by Herskovits, 1986); therefore, we are
concerned with the field of secondary spatial deixis (Ehrich, 1985). In the studies reported
below, only spatial relations on the primary horizontal axis, i.e. the sagittal axis, are considered
which are expressed by the English prepositions in front of and behind, and by the German
prepositions vor and hinter, respectively. However, implicit treatment is also given to spatial
relations on the secondary horizontal axis, i.e. the transversal axis, which is expressed by on
the left and on the right, or links and rechts, respectively. For spatial relations on the vertical
line, however, some special reflections would be needed (Friederici, 1989; Leveit, 1984, 1986).
Firstly, we will explain why ambiguity arises with the interpretation of the prepositions that
refer to relations on the first horizontal axis, or with the interpretation of utterances that
contain these prepositions, respectively. Secondly, we will outline some attempts that have
already been introduced in order to explain the conditions in which the prepositions are used in
the one or in the other way. Thirdly, we will present some of our own experiments on the
prepositional use in German. The results show that there is, in fact, substantial ambiguity when
the prepositions are interpreted. There are at least three factors which determine the
interpretation of German vor [in front o.1] and hinter [behind]; however, they altogether do not
allow for the complete prediction of the hearers' interpretations. In the last section, we
introduce the hypothesis that part of the existing ambiguity is based on the fact that German
belongs to a particular type of languages, as regards its prepositional inventory. Further
experiments in different languages show that this hypothesis proves true. From this, it will be
concluded what extensions are needed to reach a comprehensive theory of the use of spatial
prepositions that is not restricted to a particular type oflangnages.
 COMPREHENSION OF SPATIAl, PREPOSITIONS 21

THE PROBLEM: FRAMES OF REFERENCE IN DIMENSIONAL

LOCALIZATION
According to Klein (1994, p. 165), there are three preconditions that must be met in order to
make space-related utterances function, i.e., to enable the hearer, on the basis of a spatial
utterance, to identify the referent that has been intended by the speaker: (1) The interlocutors
must share a sufficiently similar conception of space. (2) They must know the lexical meanings
of the spatial expressions that are used. (3) They must bring in )>all sorts of context
information<< in order to interpret the utterance appropriately. In our paper, the problem of the
use and the potential ambiguity of in front of and behind--and their corresponding
prepositions in other languages--will be mainly discussed with respect to the context-related
aspect; conditions (1) and (2) will only briefly be outlined without explaining the related
problems in detail.
As far as the human conception of space is concerned, it is generally assumed that objects
occupy places, and that for places a topological and a dimensional structure is defined. The
human conception of space can be explained anthropomorphously, because the human being is
considered to be the primary origo which structures and dimensions space (cf. Grabowski, i.
prep.): (i) The individual occupies a particular place where no other object can be at the same
time, except when it is inside the individual (= inclusion). (ii) Other objects, or the places they
take, can physically adjoin the individual (= contact relation). (iii) There is a region that
surrounds the individual and that can be regarded as the individual's manipulation area, i.e. the
spatial area that can be reached with one's hands, with one's senses, etc. These are the three
determinants of the topological structure of space; they make it possible to differentiate
between in, or inside, and not in, or outside (qua (i)); between at, or on (in some of its senses),
and not at, or not on (qua (ii)); and between near and far from, or distant from (qua (iii)). It
should be taken into account that the topological structure, as defined above, is not exclusively
applied to the three-dimensional space. (It also fits, e.g., two-dimensional relations.)
Two further assumptions are needed to describe the dimensional structure of space: (iv) The
human conception of space is three-dimensional. (v) However, this is not an Euclidean Space
where it would be arbitrary which space point is the origin, and where the orientation and the
polarization of the three axes would also be arbitrary, except for the demand that they are
pairwise orthogonai. Rather, orientation and polarization of the three axes result from the
asymmetries of the human body: The vertical line is the axis through one's head and feet; the
head is the positive pole, the feet are the negative pole. The primary horizontal axis runs
through one's chest and back; the positive pole, the front, points to the direction where the
human senses function best. The secondary horizontal axis is orthogonai to both
aforementioned axes. It is discussed controversially whether this axis is also asymmetric;
however, the left and right side of the human body are distinguishable with respect to one's
handedness and the lateral position of organs that do not exist in pairs. The orientation and
polarization of the space-dimensioning axes subdivide the individual's region into partial
spaces, or subspaces; thus, six subspaces are defined that correspond to the dimensional
prepositions: IN-FRONT-OF, BEHIND, ABOVE, BELOW, ON-THE-RIGHT, ON-THE-
LEFT. (As the subspaces are concepts, it does not matter how they are named; however, we
found in our experiments that at least for American English in back of instead of behind was
never used to express spatial relations on the primary horizontal axis.)
So far, the characteristics of the human conception of space have been derived egocentrically;
they can also be assigned to other people and to other objects. Below, we will come back to
this point in detail.
22 J. GRABOWSKI and P. WEISS

The linguistic expressions for the dimensional subspaces are called the system of secondary
spatial deixis (Ehrich, 1985; here, we restrict ourselves to prepositional expressions,
neglecting adverbs and adjectives.) The traditional semantic description of these expressions
makes use of a localizing function; this function localizes the object that is to be localized in a
particular subspace of the reference object. Thus, the function uses the topological inclusion
and the subdivision of the region of the reference object into subspaces (Wunderlich and
Herweg, 1991). According to this approach, e.g., behind the church is semantically described
as IN the BEHIND-subspace of the church, or 1N the subspace that adjoins the back side of
the church, where the back side of the church is the side that points to the negative pole of the
primary horizontal axis, and where 1N is the topological inclusion. The meanings of the other
dimensional prepositions can be defined similarly. This way of semantically defining
prepositional meanings does not reflect our opinion; we prefer, for several reasons, to
reconstruct the meanings of spatial prepositions in terms of the perceptual accessibility of
objects and not in terms of the inclusion in subspaces adjacent to the reference object
(Grabowski, i. prep.). However, we can leave it at that for the following. It should be noticed
that, in the traditional semantical view, the comprehension of a prepositional expression and
the identification of the intended subspace presupposes the identification of the corresponding
side of the reference object.
When the human body is regarded as the primary origo that dimensions space, no problems
arise with the determination of the front side, the back side, etc., because of the
aforementioned asymmetries of the human body. However, there are many cases where the
Ego is no reliable candidate to serve as an anchor of spatial relations. Besides egocentricity, we
conceive ourselves to move through the word, and we conceive the world to be a world of
stable relations between objects. With our own movement, we continuously change our
position and the relative orientation of our egocentric body axes, particularly the horizontal
axes: You turn around, and what has been in front of you is now on your left. Moreover, we
know that every other individual constitutes an egocentric origo as well that defines the spatial
axes from his or her perspective. Therefore, it is useful to establish the spatial position of an
object not only with respect to one's own egocentric origo, but to establish a relation to
another object that is presumably more stable with respect to its spatial position and
orientation. For that, it is necessary to determine the sides of the reference object; here, its
front and back. However, this leads to three problems: (a) There are several principles
according to which the front, or the back, respectively, can be assigned to an object; (b) in
some cases, the alternative principles of front and back assignment compete, i.e. they lead to
conflicting assignments; (c) in most cases, it is not possible to deduce from spatial expressions
which principle has been used.
The two main principles that speakers and hearers use to assign the front and back of objects--
in order to make the establishment of a dimensional relation possible--are the extrinsic and the
intrinsic frame of reference (Carlson-Radvansky and Irwin, 1993; Ehrich, 1985; Grabowski,
1994; Levelt, 1986; Retz-Schmidt, 1988). Within the intrinsic frame of reference, the speaker
refers to the inherent spatial properties and axial asymmetries of the reference object. As
described above, these properties exist for human beings and for all other living things that can
move, but also for physical objects that are used in a characteristic orientation, e.g., cars and
vehicles in general, clothes, clocks, closets and desks. Within the extrinsic frame of reference,
fronts are assigned to objects by characteristics of the situation context. Here, different
principles exist (Wunderlich, 1982); we only refer to a particular principle which is often
confronted with the intrinsic system: the deictic frame of reference. In the deictic system, the
speaker's, or the observer's, position and orientation is used in order to determine the front of
an object. How does the deictic principle work? In our culture, it follows the principle of
 COMPR~tIt~NSION 01, SPA I‘IAI, PRIIf’OSI’I‘IONS 23

canonical encounter (Clark, 1973), which is also called the facing strategy: The side of an
object that faces the observer, or the speaker, is attributed its front. Within other cultures (Hill,
1982), or within alternative systems of the extrinsic frame in our culture, e.g., when an object
is moving, the aligning strategy is used for deictic front assignment; here, the reference object
is conceived as being co-oriented with the observer, thus ‘looking’ into the same direction as
the observer and having its front at the side that does not face the observer. Figure 1 shows the
deictic use, based on the facing strategy as it is predominantly used with static objects, and the
intrinsic use of in front of and behind.

6 behind

RO

in front of
f

Fig. 1. The use of in front of and behind in the deictic (left box)
and in the intrinsic (right box) frame of reference. In the
deictic case the observer (Obs) induces the front of the
reference object (RO) by facing it; this allows for the
determination of the orientation of the reference object
on the primary horizontal axis.
It is possible to formally define the uses of in front of and behind in terms of an Euclidean
spatial structure (cf. Grabowski, 1994; Klein, 1994).
In the deictic system, the observer, or speaker, is the origin 0 of a coordinate system; his or
her line of vision constitutes the positive segment of the ordinate, with y(0) = 0. Let L be the
localized object and RO the reference object with y(L) > 0 and y(R0) > 0; i.e., the related
objects are in the origin’s line of vision. L is in front of RO, if y(L) < y(R). L is behind RO, if
Y(L) ’ Y(RO).
In the intrinsic system, which is independent of an observer, the reference object RO
constitutes the origin with y(R0) = 0. L is in front of RO, if y(L) > 0. L is behind RO, if
y(L) < 0. In this formal definition it is disregarded to what extent the use of inpont of and
behind is tolerant of lateral deviations, i.e. which relations of ly(L) - y(RO)I to Ix(L) - x(RO)I
can be managed with the use of infvont of and behind and which call for the use of Ieft and
right or for combined expressions of both dimensions.
The intrinsic system can only be used in cases where the reference object is intrinsically
oriented. However, the problem of ambiguity arises from the fact that in these cases the deictic
system can also be used and that the deictic and the intrinsic uses of infront of and behind lead
to conflicting interpretations, as shown in Fig. 1. Language offers means to unambiguously
indicate which system has been used: Expressions like from my point of view or from your

LX 18/1-2-B
24 .1. (II~,AI3()WSKIzlndP. WI,IIS.S

point of view can only be meant, and understood, deictically; phrases like on the left hand side
or at the front of can only be meant, and understood, intrinsically. However, in everyday
communication people almost without exception refrain from using these means (Grabowski
and Miller, i. prep.). Therefore, localizing utterances that refer to an intrinsically oriented
reference object are in most cases ambiguous. This ambiguity is illustrated in Fig. 2 where the
spatial positions of both cats can be appropriately expressed by both sentences The cat is in
front of the convertible, and The cat is on the left of the convertible.

Fig. 2. ]he cat is in front of the convertible.- The cat is" on the
left of the convertible.

DETERMINANTS OF THE CHOICE OF A FRAME OF REFERENCE

Two questions arise: What conditions lead to the use of one of both frames of reference? And:
What conditions make the hearer to interpret localizing expressions either deictically or
intrinsically? Without claiming completeness, we will outline four approaches that appear to be
the most relevant ones to offer an answer to these questions (c£ Grabowski, 1994; WeiB,
1993).
According to Miller and Johnson-Laird (1976; see also Abkarian, 1982), the intrinsic
perspective generally dominates the deictic perspective in cases where the reference object is
conceived as inherently oriented. This assumption requires, in order to allow for successful
spatial communication, that the members of a culture and language community agree with
respect to their conceptions of objects being intrinsically oriented or not (or being intrinsically
oriented in certain kinds of situations). We have strong doubts about this precondition, because
there are so many possibilities to assign situation-dependent fronts to objects without referring
to any intrinsic properties (Herrmann, 1990). Moreover, even if an object is more or less
unambiguously oriented, the polarization of the axes may change from situation to situation.
With respect to the canonical perspective of a person that is going to church, i.e. who is
approaching the church from outside, the front of the church is where the portal is, and the
altar is in the back of the church. From the canonical perspective of the person who is finally
sitting in the church, the front of the church is where the altar is, and the portal is in the back of
the church. Thus, churches have two different intrinsic fronts and backs. However, we will
show below that the assumption of intrinsic preference in cases where the inherent orientation
and polarity of the reference object is unambiguous allows for an adequate description of the
use of the English prepositions, but not, e.g., of the German prepositions.
 COMPREttENSION OF SPATIAl, PREPOSITIONS 25

Ehrich (1985) examines room descriptions and shows that the integration of separate groups of
objects into more extensive spatial arrangements is facilitated when a strategy, i.e. deictic or
intrinsic reference, is kept up through the entire discourse (el. Linde and Labov, 1975; von
Stutterheim and Carroll, 1993). However, spatial expressions are not always embedded in an
extensive spatial discourse context as it is the case with room descriptions or directions; they
sometimes appear separately, or in a non-spatial context, where the hearer can not refer to a
previously chosen strategy of reference in order to interpret a spatial expression either
deictically or intrinsically.
Wunderlich (1981) points out that the static vs. dynamic character of a situation in which an
object is localized--expressed by the use of static or dynamic verbs--influences the
interpretation of spatial relations between objects. Deictic interpretation is preferred for spatial
relations that include motion verbs (e.g., Put the lamp to the right of the sofa.), whereas
intrinsic interpretation is preferred for spatial expressions that include static verbs (e.g., The
lamp shouM remain on the right of the sofa.) (In German, no differences arise between the use
of prepositions in the context of dynamic or static verbs, as opposed to the change from to the
right to on the right in the English example.) However, there is no deterministic
correspondence between the chosen frame of reference and the static vs. dynamic factor;
Wunderlich merely found correspondences that range from 70 to 80 per cent.
Levelt (1982) points to individual styles and preferences in the choice of the deictic or intrinsic
frame of reference. However, we found in our experiments that inconsistent interpretations
arise between individuals as well as within individuals (Grabowski, i. prep.). Furthermore, the
assumption of individual styles does not appear to be plausible at all: Imagine that somebody
developed such a style of either constant deictic or constant intrinsic preference. It seems
reasonable that this localizing strategy is applied to the interpretation of utterances as well as
to the production of one's own utterances. However, we do not select our communication
partners according to their style of spatial reference; spatial communication must succeed
between any partners. If the 'deictics' and the 'intrinsics' were equally distributed in the
population, maximum fuzziness of communication would arise; i.e., only 50 per cent of the
utterances that can be interpreted either deictically or intrinsically would be interpreted by
hearers in the same way than they had been intended by speakers; that is chance level. On the
other hand, if one of both styles would be predominant in the population, one wonders why the
members of the smaller group have their strategy of spatial reference cultivated as a style in the
face of their frequent communicative failure. Participants in experiments are generally prone to
develop constant patterns of reaction when they are repeatedly exposed to similar tasks; these
patterns may look like stable habits of general behavior, although they merely reflect a task-
dependent response set.
Each of the mentioned approaches, as well as further approaches that we did not mention here,
consider one aspect that contributes to the prediction of the deictic vs. intrinsic interpretation
of spatial expressions. However, even if they are taken together they do not allow for a
comprehensive and satisfactory answer to the question of how dimensional prepositions are
used. In the experiments reported next, we will show that in German, in fact, considerable
ambiguity exists when the prepositions vor [in front o31 and hinter [behind] are interpreted,
and we will examine the conditions in which ambiguity arises. Then, we will introduce several
factors that have been experimentally considered in order to clarify the problem.
26 ,I. (ilIAt~OWSKI and P. Wt,21SS

EXPERIMENTS ON THE INTERPRETATION OF VOR AND HINTER

Consider the following example (Fig. 3) that is also referred to by Vater (1991) and by
Ruhrberg and Rutz (1990) in order to illustrate an ambiguous situation; we will use this
example for the experiments reported below (see Grabowski, 1994; Grabowski et al., 1993;
WeiB, 1993; for further details): A driver and a front-seat passenger are driving in a car in the
right lane of a road. At a visible distance ahead, there are parking spots on the right side of the
road. In the center spot there is an object. The passenger asks the driver to stop the car either
in front of this object or behind this object; thus, the object in the center spot serves as the
reference object in the localizing utterance.
The following explanations hold for all experimental variants that will be reported: Participants
were positioned in front of the setting illustrated in Fig. 3; this setting was approximately 60 x
40 cm in size and was constructed from toy material. The reference object occupied the center
spot; it was either a yellow Volkswagen beetle, representing an intrinsically oriented object, or
a tree, representing a non-oriented object. Participants were orally instructed by the
experimenter; then, they moved the toy car (that, according to the instructions, contains the
speaker and hearer) to the spot that corresponds to their interpretation of the spatial utterance
given in the instruction (see below). Experimentation was conducted with one participant at
one time. During the participants' recruitment, they were asked whether they have a driver's
license; therefore, they assumed that a traffic-related problem is investigated. Not a single
participant came up with the hypothesis that this was a study on spatial expressions. However,
this naivet6 desired by the experimenter--can be maintained through only one experimental
run. Therefore, only one measurement was obtained from each participant (the chosen spot).
According to Fig. 3, we will call the free parking spots subspace 1 or subspace 3, respectively;
this is due to the theoretical assumption of prepositions referring to subspaces of the region of
the reference object.

I ~ oar
subspace3

• " I " " object

yb:,.~.l.
I II~ c'r

: ror
Fig. 3. The setting that was used for the experiments on the use
of vor [in front of] and hinter [behind].
Firstly, we embedded the basic pattern of our setting in a private and informal situation. Here,
participants were instructed as follows (instructions are given in translation): "Imagine you are
giving a friend a lilt home. But you don't know exactly where he lives. He says: Could you
 C()MPRI.~It]NSION OF SPATIAl, I~RI,It~()SITIONS 27

please drop me off in front of [vor]/behind [hinter] the yellow beetle/the tree? Where would
you stop your car?"
Considering the state of the art outlined in the preceding section, it is to be expected that in
case of a non-oriented reference object (tree) the deictic interpretation is chosen, in case of an
oriented reference object (yellow beetle) the intrinsic interpretation is preferred. The deictic
interpretation corresponds to the choice of subspace 1 for vor [in front oJ] and of subspace 3
for hinter [behind]; the intrinsic interpretation corresponds to the opposite assignments of
subspaces to prepositional phrases, i.e. subspace 3 for vor [in front oJ] and subspace 1 for
hinter [behind]. Ambiguity is only expected, if at all, in case of the intrinsically oriented yellow
beetle being the reference object. The results are shown in Table 1.
Table 1. Frequency of choices of either subspace when inter-
preting vor or hinter in an informal situation (lift home).
The left part of the table shows the frequencies for the
non-oriented reference object (tree), the right part for
the oriented object (yellow beetle).

tree subspace yellow beetle subspaee

1 3 1 3
"vor" 20 0 "vor" 24 15
"hinter" 3 17 "hinter" 23 17
total 23 17 total 47 32

As has been expected, interpretation is predominantly deictic in case of the non-oriented

reference object. However, the interpretations are inconsistent in case of the oriented reference
object. Here, maximum ambiguity arises; the prepositions do not differentiate between the
subspaces: Speakers do not succeed to influence the hearers' reaction by the choice of a
particular preposition. In summary, it is shown that the intrinsic orientedness of the reference
object is indeed an important determinant of the interpretation ofvor and hinter.
In the results shown in Table 1, as well as in further results, we find a few cases where non-
deictic interpretations occur even when the reference object has no intrinsic features of
orientation. These results are explained to be based on extrinsic interpretations, where the tree
is attributed a front that points into the direction in which the speaker's and hearer's car is
moving.
A note on the statistical analysis of the results: Our decisions on ambiguity existing or not, i.e.
the judgments on whether, in a given situation, the spatial prepositions differentiate between
both subspaces, are based on quantitative analyses of the frequency tables carried out with the
Fisher Test. This is a extension of the Binomial Test for two-dimensional frequency
distributions (of. Siegel, 1988). The differentiation of the prepositions between the subspaces is
statistically significant if the predominant number of cases falls into the two cells of one of the
diagonals in the table of results. For example, this is the case in Table 1 (left part) with the tree
being the reference object.
In the next step of experimentation, we changed the characteristics of the situation into which
space-related communication is embedded. The lift home situation has been described to be
informal and private. Now, we chose a formal and institutionalized situation in which the
spatial utterances are produced and interpreted: The participants were to imagine to take their
28 J. (IRAI~OWSKIand P. WlilNS

driving test, receiving instructions by the examiner to park either in front of or behind the
reference object. Results are shown in Table 2.
Table 2. Frequency of choices of either subspace when inter-
preting vor or hinter in an institutionalized situation
(driving test). The left part of the table shows the
frequencies for the non-oriented reference object (tree),
the fight part for the oriented object (yellow beetle).

tree subspace yellow beetle subspace

1 3 1 3
"vor.' 8 2 "vor" 3 17
"hinter" 7 3 "hinter" 17 3
total 15 5 total 20 20

Here we find quite the opposite results, compared to the informal situation reported before:
Again, the orientedness of the reference object is an important determinant of the
interpretation. However, here we find predominating intrinsic interpretations when the
reference object is oriented, whereas the ambiguity arises with the non-oriented reference
object where the speaker can not guide the hearer's reaction by the use of one of both
prepositions, i.e., the prepositions do not differentiate between the alternative subspaces. Each
result has been replicated for several times and, thus, proved stable and reliable.
Summarizing the results obtained from German (Table 3), we find that an explanation of the
interpretation patterns of vor and hinter calls for the interaction of two factors: the formal or
informal characteristic of the social situation in which spatial communication occurs, and the
existing or non-existing intrinsic orientedness of the reference object.
Table 3. Two determinants of the interpretation of German vor
and hinter: the social situation and the orientedness of
the reference object.

reference object
situation

oriented non-oriented

lift home ambiguous unambiguous (deictic)

driving test unambiguous (intrinsic) ambiguous

P o s t hoc, the results may be explained as follows: In an institutionalized and formal situation,
people in our culture prefer a neutral reference point, an embedding of the spatial relation that
is not bound to the unstable position of the interlocutors, i.e., they prefer the intrinsic frame of
 COMPREI IENSION Ol; SPATIAl, PREPOSITIONS 29

reference and they expect, in the role of the hearer, the intrinsic flame to be used. In an
informal situation, people prefer one of the involved individuals to be the reference point, i.e.,
they prefer the deictic system. The non-oriented tree in the lift-home situation and the oriented
car in the driving-test situation fit these standards--and the interpretation of spatial
prepositions is unambiguous. However, in the lift-home situation there is a conflict between the
intrinsic orientedness of the yellow beetle and the preference for the deictic flame; therefore,
deictic or intrinsic interpretations result alternatively. In the driving-test situation, there is a
conflict between the non-ofientedness of the tree and the preference for the intrinsic frame;
again, deictic or intrinsic interpretations result alternatively. In this case, the preference for the
non-personal embedding of the spatial relation becomes realizable by assigning the tree an
'objective' orientation on the basis of the extrinsic frame of reference. Moreover, the
interpretation patterns of vor and hinter are not symmetrical: vor is more often understood
deictically, hinter is more oi~en conceived intrinsic.
In further experiments not reported here (Grabowski, i. prep.; WeiB, 1993), we proved that the
observed inconsistencies of interpretation are not merely due to the fact that it would not
matter in the given situations where exactly to stop the car.
Consider two additional results: When, in the lift-home situation, the alignment of the oriented
reference object (the yellow beetle) with the direction of the road is removed (a difference of
just 30 ° is enough), the conflict disappears and unanimous (deictic) interpretations arise (see
Fig. 4).

I i~ca r
;'ub~ yellow
.... beetle
subspace • "I" " i ~1
lla sub,aceI~ car
*vor" 10 0

*hinter" 0 9 car with

total 10 9 and heare~

Fig. 4. Frequency of choices of either subspace when the

alignment of the direction of the road with the intrinsic
orientedness of the reference object is removed (lilt-home
situation).
Similar results arise when the conflict between deictic and intrinsic interpretation is resolved by
putting the reference car in opposite direction which leads to corresponding interpretations
within both the deictic and the intrinsic system (Fig. 5).
30 J. (H~,AI~;()WSKIand P. W1,;INS

subspace
1 I 3
ii',ii =
:u'.
"vor" 8 2

"hinter" 0 10 I,_, ] car with

' ,
total 8 12

Fig. 5. Frequency of choices of either subspace when the

oriented reference object is put in opposite direction
(deictic and intrinsic interpretations correspond).

THE PREPOSITIONAL INVENTORY AS A DETERMINANT OF

INTERPRETATION
The factors 'social situation' and 'orientedness of the reference object' allow for the prediction
of the interpretation of vor and hinter only with respect to particular interactions of both
determining factors. Are there any further determinants that would allow for the prediction of
the ambiguous cells? For that, we consider the relationship between spatial reference and
temporal reference. There are many indications and detailed linguistic analyses in favor of a
close connection of both reference systems (Ehrich, 1989; Traugott, 1978; Wunderlich, 1985).
In our experimental situation, the dynamics is fixed, therefore, the spatial order can also be
expressed by temporal metaphors. Subspace 1 is the subspace next to the speaker and hearer, it
is reached first and therefore, it is reached before the reference object is reached.
Correspondingly, subspace 3 'comes' after the reference object. In German, there is only one
prepositional word form to express the unmarked poles of the spatial and the temporal
secondary deixis; it is the preposition vor. (This is different from English, where before has a
spatial and a temporal meaning, but in front of is restricted to the expression of spatial
relations. In German, there is no preposition like in front of which is understood spatially in
every case.) For the marked poles, there are two different word forms hinter [behind] and
nach [after] that clearly distinguish between the temporal and the spatial system. For German,
the following question arises: Could it be that part of the observed ambiguity does not reflect a
conflict between the deictic and the intrinsic frame of reference used for interpretation, but--as
far as the use of vor is concerned--reflects the conflict between the temporal and the spatial
interpretation?
How to prove this hypothesis? Languages differ from each other with respect to the number of
different prepositional expressions that are provided to express spatial relations on the primary
horizontal axis and temporal relations. More precisely, the difference between languages is
whether there are spatial prepositions that are not identical with temporal prepositions.
Neither, our aim is to exhaustively analyze the potential of meaning of these prepositions, nor
do we touch the fact that temporal metaphors may generally be used in order to express spatial
relations. In the context at issue, the only interesting feature of languages is whether there are
spatial (dimensional) prepositions that can not be interpreted temporally.
 COMI~RI.IIIENSION O1. SPAIIAI. I~RI.3~OSITI()NS 31

In order to test the aforementioned typological hypothesis, it is necessary to study the use of
spatial prepositions in languages which have a prepositional system different from German.
With respect to the temporal axis and the primary horizontal axis, a language can provide their
users with a maximum of four different expressions as it is the case in French (devant/derri~re,
avant/apr~s), in Italian (davanti/dietro, prima/dopo) and in English (in front of~behind,
before~after). We will call these languages four preposition languages. German is a three
preposition language (vor/hinter, vor/nach), the same holds for Dutch (voor/achter, voor/na).
There are also two preposition languages like Latin where ante and post are used to express
spatial as well as temporal relations. We do not know of a one preposition language where
one single expression would differentiate neither between the temporal and the spatial system
nor between their marked and unmarked poles.
In order to show that there is in fact an influence of language topology and not merely a
phenomenon within one particular language, it is necessary to study more than one language of
each type. Therefore, we conducted the German experiments reported in the previous section
also in Dutch, French, Italian, and English. Thus, we contrasted three preposition languages
with four preposition languages (Fig. 6). The experimental instructions for the participants
have been translated into each target language; vor and hinter have been replaced by the
prepositions that are listed in the left half of the diagrams shown in Fig. 6. Instructions were
given by native speakers of the examined languages who served as experimenters; the
experiments were carded out at universities in the respective countries (for details see the
acknowledgments at the end of our paper).

French

devant avant

derri6re apr~s

German Italian
vor vor davanti prima

hinter nach dietro dopo

Dutch English
voor voor in front of before
==
achter na behind after

Fig. 6. The prepositional inventory of the five languages being

investigated. The left column of the diagrams shows the
prepositions for the primary horizontal axis, in the fight
column, the prepositions for the temporal axis are listed.
The obtained results will not be reported in detail here. We merely summarize the results with
respect to the conditions in which the interpretations of the prepositional expressions were
either unanimous or ambiguous (Fig. 7).
32 J. GRABOWSKI and P. WEISS

G /oriented :r°:nted
lift home intr.
driving | intr t'rising n,r
test / '

[~ [oriented ;r°:nted I °riented];~ ed

lift homl ~ deict. lift home[ Intr.

,n,r. I dect. ,dristing I intr.

F orientednon-
lift home Intr. o~d
ambiguous driving
test intr ntr.

Fig. 7. The interpretation of the prepositions of the primary

horizontal axis in dependence of the social situation, the
orientedness of the reference object, and the type of
language as regards its prepositional inventory. The
hatched boxes indicate cases in which ambiguity was
observed; intr. = unanimous intrinsic interpretation;
deict. = unanimous deictic interpretation. G = German,
D = Dutch, F = French, I = Italian, E = English.
The results show that German and Dutch on the one hand, and French, Italian and English on
the other hand, show quite similar patterns of interpretation. In three preposition languages,
there is an interaction between both factors 'social situation' and 'orientedness' that is needed to
consider in order to predict the participants' reactions. In four preposition languages, however,
the orientedness of the reference object appears to be the only significant factor. When the
spatial relation on the primary horizontal axis is established with respect to a non-oriented
reference object, no unanimous interpretation is observed regardless of the kind of social
situation. In these languages, the prepositional inventory appears to be designed for being used
in connection with intrinsically oriented reference objects.
Nevertheless, the observed ambiguity can not be put down to the fact that the participants
were to interpret utterances they would never use in the given situation; i.e. that the utterances
were somehow deficient or that they would lack clear information. We conducted identical
experiments in German and English from the perspective of language production, where the
participants were given the intended subspace and where they were asked to generate, in the
role of the passenger, an appropriate utterance that would guide the hearers' identification of
the intended subspace (Grabowski, 1994; Grabowski and Miller, i. prep.). We found that in all
conditions more than half of the participants produced the very same utterances that we used in
the interpretation experiments, i.e. they produced simple prepositional phrases in which the
 COMPREffENSION ()1"SPATIAI~PREPOSITIONS 33

intended subspace was related to the reference object in the center spot by means of in front of
or behind, or vor and hinter, respectively. That is to say that speakers, when localizing, use
just those kinds of utterances that they can not unambiguously interpret when they take the
role of the hearer; they are not aware of the potential ambiguity and of the alternative frames of
spatial reference---which they master perfectly well. Even in the face of everyday
communicative fuzziness and ambiguity, they are convinced of the fact that language use is
clear and unambiguous (cf. Buhl, 1995). However, some of our participants contacted us after
months and reported that they lost their referential innocence, being always aware that
whenever something is in front of an object it might also be behind it at the same time. In this
respect, our experiments can, unintendedly, be considered a contribution to linguistic
enlightenment.

RESU
There are three conclusions that appear to be most important:
1. In Anglo-American research, the preference of the intrinsic system in cases where the
reference object is inherently oriented is otten claimed. This claim seems to be correct for the
type of language English belongs to. However, intrinsic preference is not a general principle.
For German, for example, the theoretical assumption is valid only within restrictions, because
of the fact that the influence of the prepositional inventory provided by a language on the
interpretation of dimensional prepositions is being overlooked.
2. The intrinsic orientedness of the reference object has already been considered in the
approaches that have been developed hitherto. However, there are at least two further
determinants of the use of dimensional prepositions: the characteristic of the social situation in
which spatial relations are conceived, and the prepositional inventory provided by the language
at issue.
3. In all languages we examined empirically, ambiguity occurs in systematic cases. It is not the
case that one language is generally more suitable than another language to express spatial
reference by the use of dimensional prepositions. However, according to the prepositional
inventory communication succeeds differently well in different cases.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Our experiments in languages other than German were made possible by the hospitality and the
generous support from several colleagues: Wolfgang Klein (Nijmegen), Michel Fayol and
Bratrice Bourdin (Dijon), Bianca de Bernardi (Verona), George Miller and Christiane
Fellbaum (Princeton). We are grateful to Irene ter Haar, Alexa Heintze, Emanuela Antolini and
Shaft Landes who patiently and reliably instructed our participants in their native languages.
The English experiments were supported by a grant of the German Science Foundation (DFG)
to the first author. Gisela Zifonun contributed helpful comments on an earlier version of our
paper.

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